Thanks Ian, yes I think she'll be on the water in a week or two. In between the various coats of paint I've still been playing around with the wheelhouse, and Sam is now permanently on board to help with the work up, as you can see Sam comes from a time before the powers that be dictated our entire lives, smoking in the work place indeed, naughty Sam.

Finally finished the paint work, not my strong point I have to admit, had to scrape off the boot topping due to the first one reacting and crazing , so redone with white acrylic which seems OK, all that's left to do is to make up something resembling a winch for the fore deck, fit the bollards and fit the tyres around and find some sort of rubber for the rams.

Ok, so she isn't a Rembrandt. But she has been well finished and you made the effort to re do the Boot topping, so you can't say you bodged it.

I saw on a friend's Military Trawler that the winch looked like it had been made from a set of G gauge railway wheels (for the sides of the drum) and other gizmology, so if you know of a friendly model railway shop that sells stuff like that, they may have a pair of wheels you can use?

Finally finished the paint work, not my strong point I have to admit, had to scrape off the boot topping due to the first one reacting and crazing , so redone with white acrylic which seems OK, all that's left to do is to make up something resembling a winch for the fore deck, fit the bollards and fit the tyres around and find some sort of rubber for the rams.

Rubber for the Rams = a section from an old Timing Belt, ask at your local Garage for one.

Well I finished the winch and it works just got to wind some "cable" on the drum, truth be told it's probably a bit over scale but Springers are supposed to be fun so I'm not too bothered about it, Sam's a little guy and this is a BIG winch.

Just about finished now, I made a oil drum and cast some off to add a bit of interest to the fore deck, fitted the fender tyres, still need to get the rubber for the rams, she has been great fun to build, it made a change to build from imagination next we'll see how she performs on the lake.

Yes the moulds are made from flexible silicone rubber, I get the silicone and resin from www.easycomposites.co.uk ok it's not cheap but it goes a long way, and I find it a fascinating extension to our hobby, I'm certainly not a master at it but it's really quite easy, just take some time making the fitting, fittings with a base such as bollard are the easiest, bond the fitting into a "box", I make the box out of styrene, mix the silicone and fill the box being careful to avoid air bubbles, when cured remove the sides of the box and remove the mould, depending on the fitting you can just flex the mould off others you need to cut the mould in half, it will then fit together and held with elastic band, mix the resin and fill the mould again avoiding air bubbles, that's it make as many as you want.

Gopha Girl had her first trials today, have to say very pleased with it, the handling and performance exceeded my expectations, more than enough power which will be useful when pushing and the fishtail rudder really dose the job, hard over she pivots on the spot, a good speed before the tendency to dip the bow, I did make the mistake of ballast trimming before I decided to add the winch and fore deck detail so this was enough to lose the slightly bow up attitude, so now have removed some ballast, when I got home I noticed she had shipped a small amount of water I suspect the prop tube, I've never liked the greased one that much but I used it as I had it spare, with hind sight I think it would have been worth the expense of a water proof one, it took some more grease though the grease tube so maybe I didn't have enough in it, I've just sectioned off the area beneath the inboard end to form a coffer dam to contain any more drips, all in all she's a lot of fun to sail

Lovely work chaps! That weathering would make a military modeller proud!

I am glad that even with a simpler model you have found some things to teach us Joe. I will keep the coffer dam idea for future projects, though probably making sure your tubes etc are water tight/secure is more important.

Thanks to all for your interest and comments, Went on her second trials today again nearly two hours in the water and this time dry inside the first time must have been lack of grease in prop shaft, so I think now I'll take her every time, reassuring to know there's a back up.

Just an update on fitting my spare 12 volt smoke generator, when I built her I thought that I may fit one at some point so made provisions in the exhausts etc. so it was just a case of making a chamber under the two stacks and fit the smoker in the right place and wire into the ESC, there is a bit too much smoke indoors but with forward movement and a bit of a breeze I hoping it will look more realistic.